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A review by bookreadreceipts
No Woods So Dark as These by Randall Silvis
2.0
Thanks in advance for an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
This is my first book from the author and given that it's a series, I may have been a bit at a disadvantage not having known the context of the previous book. However, overall I thought with was a good read, not without its problems, but certainly, a book fans of the series may appreciate in addition to anyone looking for a true detective / crime read.
Pros: The chapter pacing was helpful in keeping me engaged. The prose at times was very refined and I appreciated the author and story taking on some very heavy topics including miscarriage, infertility, family dynamics, the aftereffects of abuse, drug use and rehabilitation, and mental health. The crime itself also had a very neat and tidy ending, though anti-climactic.
Cons: I almost put the book down entirely after how we're introduced to Jayme and the way in which she describes abortion as the scraping of a child and dismembering of body parts. I can be empathetic entirely to her circumstances, but this passage comes before we really know what happened to her pregnancy and how it ended and completely contrasts with how we're told to view her character throughout the book. She views abortion in that manner but also cries when a junkie she never even met dies from heart failure brought on by an overdose. She's DeMarco's light, his positivity, his anchor to goodness, yet here she is effectively bashing abortion and perpetuating language that has been used to argue against a women's choice. Given the book deals with such heavy topics of good people losing their way and lives to drugs, I wonder how there's no empathy to consider the circumstances under which someone would need to have an abortion.
Moving on, the repeated discussion over neutering the dog veered on obsessive and at times felt like a dialogue filler that did not move the plot forward. To that end, I felt there was almost too much of Jayme and DeMarco's relationship vs. the larger plot itself. The perspective of Flores was interesting, though her depression seemed incredibly severe, and as quickly as we got to her story we then flitted away from it, never revisiting it again.
Then there's the issue of editing. There were some references to Captain Boyd vs. Trooper Boyd and Captain Bowen. Those are obvious errors that confuse the reader. There were also instances of commas where actual dialogue ended, which looks to me like the additional dialogue was cut out without cleaning up the surrounding language. Then there's the matter of Sully. Her mother tells us Sully received a message from a guy and left in a hurry then, but when we talk to Sonny, he indicates Sully called him and came to him in a panic. This seems like an obvious detail that perhaps Reddick was moving in on Sully to tie up loose ends, which Flores and DeMarco should have picked up on, but do not.
Now, to the Khatri element. I believe it was intended to provide an overarching sense of dread and foreboding, this ominous villain from the previous book in the series, but it never came across that way. I' would randomly remember him whenever he left a note of did something, but they were few and far between that the dread of him did not linger. In addition, a single chapter (again they're usually very short) to provide more backstory on the previous book would have been helpful as I didn't get the true grasp on how dangerous Khatri is, or why / how he would have disciples. With that context, maybe Khatri would have felt like a bigger presence to me.
This is my first book from the author and given that it's a series, I may have been a bit at a disadvantage not having known the context of the previous book. However, overall I thought with was a good read, not without its problems, but certainly, a book fans of the series may appreciate in addition to anyone looking for a true detective / crime read.
Pros: The chapter pacing was helpful in keeping me engaged. The prose at times was very refined and I appreciated the author and story taking on some very heavy topics including miscarriage, infertility, family dynamics, the aftereffects of abuse, drug use and rehabilitation, and mental health. The crime itself also had a very neat and tidy ending, though anti-climactic.
Cons: I almost put the book down entirely after how we're introduced to Jayme and the way in which she describes abortion as the scraping of a child and dismembering of body parts. I can be empathetic entirely to her circumstances, but this passage comes before we really know what happened to her pregnancy and how it ended and completely contrasts with how we're told to view her character throughout the book. She views abortion in that manner but also cries when a junkie she never even met dies from heart failure brought on by an overdose. She's DeMarco's light, his positivity, his anchor to goodness, yet here she is effectively bashing abortion and perpetuating language that has been used to argue against a women's choice. Given the book deals with such heavy topics of good people losing their way and lives to drugs, I wonder how there's no empathy to consider the circumstances under which someone would need to have an abortion.
Moving on, the repeated discussion over neutering the dog veered on obsessive and at times felt like a dialogue filler that did not move the plot forward. To that end, I felt there was almost too much of Jayme and DeMarco's relationship vs. the larger plot itself. The perspective of Flores was interesting, though her depression seemed incredibly severe, and as quickly as we got to her story we then flitted away from it, never revisiting it again.
Then there's the issue of editing. There were some references to Captain Boyd vs. Trooper Boyd and Captain Bowen. Those are obvious errors that confuse the reader. There were also instances of commas where actual dialogue ended, which looks to me like the additional dialogue was cut out without cleaning up the surrounding language. Then there's the matter of Sully. Her mother tells us Sully received a message from a guy and left in a hurry then, but when we talk to Sonny, he indicates Sully called him and came to him in a panic. This seems like an obvious detail that perhaps Reddick was moving in on Sully to tie up loose ends, which Flores and DeMarco should have picked up on, but do not.
Now, to the Khatri element. I believe it was intended to provide an overarching sense of dread and foreboding, this ominous villain from the previous book in the series, but it never came across that way. I' would randomly remember him whenever he left a note of did something, but they were few and far between that the dread of him did not linger. In addition, a single chapter (again they're usually very short) to provide more backstory on the previous book would have been helpful as I didn't get the true grasp on how dangerous Khatri is, or why / how he would have disciples. With that context, maybe Khatri would have felt like a bigger presence to me.